


Built on Failure

by douchegrayson



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Galra Raised Keith, He won't be there for a while but its gonna be Sheith eventually, M/M, POV First Person, Shiro is not easy to write but I'm trying my best here, Sort Of, no beta we die like men, the WiP is The Kerberossian, the martian au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-17
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2019-10-11 19:46:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 11,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17453144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/douchegrayson/pseuds/douchegrayson
Summary: I'm stranded on Kerberos.I have no way to communicate with Earth. I have no way of knowing if the base will hold up.I have been seeing weird shadows outside. Shadows that can't be human.Language but - I'm fucked.





	1. Sol 6

**Author's Note:**

> I've been obsessed with the Martian since I've seen the movie. I got the book now and thought of this AU. So I thought I'd read a chapter and write a new one for this story as soon as I can. It's my first upload so I'm kinda nervous. I really hope I do Shiro's character justice!

Log Entry: Sol 6

 

So, when they told me I would die young, this was not exactly what I had envisioned.

And yet, here I am.

In space, stuck on the surface of a planet that was mostly ice. So much ice. An uncountable amount of ice. And me. The first and hopefully the last person to die on Kerberos.

If anyone ever finds these entries, please note from the beginning that I know that I’m done for. This was it. There is no way I’m going to get out of here.

I was surrounded by ice. And vast nothingness.

 

But perhaps, for the sake of completeness, I should start from the beginning:

My name is Takashi Shirogane, I am 21 years old and I am a Pilot of the Galaxy Garrison. You think that’s a little too young to go to space? You’re right. But I have devoted, I think, my entire life to be a pilot. To be part of this mission. 

**The Kerberos Mission.**

For the first time in the history of humanity, three people were sent out to travel distantly through the Solar System. To boldly go where no one has gone before.

 

That’s what was written in the job description.

Excuse the language, but I worked my ass off to be in the seat of the ship that - for the first time - would take three people, me included, to the farthest moon of the solar system to probe and research and see the edge of space as we knew it. 

These three people were  **Commander Sam Holt** , a renowned geologist and overall scientific genius and his overambitious son  **Matt Holt** , the youngest communication expert on staff and possibly the best one at the job. And me, Golden Boy of the Garrison as they called me. 

I’m holding every record I can possibly hold at every flight simulation I ran through, from risky flight maneuvers through meteor fields to rescue efforts from unexplored planets or comets. I have a degree in astrophysics with a minor in xenolinguism. Which had been mostly linguism with a few more what-ifs peppered in.

Now I'm pretty sure that these logs won't wander into the past so I'll spare you the extreme technical details. The galaxy garrisons ships were extremely high tech and able to cross space in near hyper speed in a matter of days. Depending on the distance months. 

The first expedition to Pluto back in 2001, executed by the  _ New Horizon _ , took 915 days. It flew by, took pictures and returned to Earth 915 days later. 

Our ship, Odysseus Y1, made the trip in 68 days.

  
So when Commander Holt finally managed to convince Commander Iverson to take me along as the pilot, I was looking forward to two months of eating frozen peas and terrible card games with Matt and Sam, one month of exploring possibly the coldest satellite in the entire solar system and another two months of frozen peas on the trip back. It was the best thing I could ever imagine.

Before we left for the flight, an unmanned cruiser was sent ahead with supplies and all the makings to set up a base that would hold up against the constant cold of -40 degree Celsius on Kerberos surface. It promised to be a cozy little place. Odysseus Y1 was built to withstand temperatures of up to -80 degrees Celsius. 

The mission was supposed to last 30 days. 

The ice storm hit us this morning. On Sol 6. 

We were just packing up another set of mineral probes that we drilled from the depth of the icy surface when the wind took up. The bio monitors in our suits gave out hectic alarm signals. The screens in our helmets showed that the temperature was dropping rapidly and we heard a voice coming through. It was Veronica, one of our hot wires to earth during the trip and the mission. “Shiro are you reading me?!” her voice was cracked and distorted. “Abort mission immediately you cannot fix Odysseus with this kind of temperature damage!” her voice was urgent. We were at -63 degree by then.

Of course she was right so I ushered Matt and Sam back to the ship.

 

You never realize just how small people are. Sam was hesitant to go so I had to push him on. I tower at least half a head above him. That's crazy. What I'm trying to say is I'm the pilot so it was my responsibility to get them to safety. Gusts of wind were whipping around us tearing our clothes back and forth - I can still hear it roaring outside. The sound terrifies me.

Odysseus was parked next to our base and a set of ice covered rocks. Ice was covering our base too by then. 

 

I remember pushing Sam and Matt back in the ship and then I heard a crack.

Next thing I know I was blown off my feet, accompanied by an excruciating pain in my side. Matt was reaching out to me.

Then black.

 

I came to, I think, at least an hour later. Had it not been for my suit I think I would be dead. 

My helmet was beginning to get frost and a glaring red warning-signal was blinding me. The big red exclamation mark was accompanied by a steady but shrill beeping sound.

Wake up. Wake up. Wake up.

So I did.

It still hurt and when I checked, I saw an icile in a place where no icicle should be. It must have broke off the roof of the base when the storm had hit. The thing was maybe two or three centimeter in diameter and had not only punched a hole through my suit but through my skin and muscles and was stopped only by my pelvis. Which hurt like hell. And it had bled like hell, too. In the time I was out, my blood had pooled around the hole and froze solid. Effectively sealing the hole and saving my life. I felt the cold against my skin.

I had this hole in my suit and sooner or later all my oxygen would have leaked through the tiny holes the bloodseal had left behind. Sounds kind of badass. The bloodseal thing.

The storm had blown me at least 50 metres away but it had subsided now. I must have crashed against a couple of ice rocks cause my back already hurts from bruising. 

I got up and with the icicle and somehow managed to get the dizziness out of my eyes. The ice storm had subsided and I had clear view to the base. Immediately, I noticed two things:  
  
The base was still intact - that was great! From afar it seemed like nothing had been damaged too severly.  
BUT Odysseus Y1 was gone - that sucked. 

Of course Matt and Sam must have thought I was dead. I had been impaled by an icicle and was blown away into the glittering mist of the storm. Matt must have started Y1 and leave. 

I cannot blame him. By all means, even I thought I was dead. 

So, Matt, Sam - if you come back in an attempt to save me in half a year and you find my frozen solid corpse and these logs:  **I’m glad you survived. Thank god you made it.**

Now 50 metres isn’t even a stone’s throw away. But I had an icicle stuck in my hip and was very dizzy and so I needed a solid ten minutes to get here, fumble around for the airlock and actually walk inside. Once the pressure had dropped and my system showed everything in the greens, I pulled the helmet off and tore the icicle out. I think that was the loudest I ever screamed. Especially since breaking the blood seal off was extra painful.

Training to be a space-pilot was extensive. You could never imagine all the stuff you had to learn. Fortunately, a four week long course on field medicine had been included. And the base had real good medical equipment.

Here I am. Suitless, shirtless; but the hole in my side fixed with seven or eight stitches and a big plaster on it. I’d take some antibiotics over the next weeks and would be fine.

The base was not designed for communication. It was designed for housing. The storm had completely wrecked the antennas fixed to the roof that I may or may not could have been able to use to contact Veronica or Curtis. 

Odysseus was gone and had possibly long left Kerberos orbit so even if I could craft some kind of flare that was bright enough to be seen from space, there was no one to see it.

 

So that’s the situation. 

I’m stranded on Kerberos. I have no way to communicate with Odysseus Y1 or Earth. Everyone thinks I’m dead. I’m in a base designed to last thirty days.

If the oxygenator breaks down, I’ll suffocate. If the filters and heaters of the water tank outside broke down, I would die of thirst. If the base breaches, I would quite simply freeze solid. If none of those things happen, I’ll eventually run out of food and starve to death. 

 

So yeah. Language but - I’m fucked.


	2. Sol 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The nature of Shiros disease has never been really explained so I tried to come up with something that kind of makes sense? I hope. For the next chapters, I'm gonna read up a lot on how to survive in arctic conditions I suppose ;;

Log Entry: Sol 7

 

Alright, so my initial moment of panic is over. I’m still fucked but I’m not  **immediately** fucked. When I woke up this morning, I took stock of what I still have.

  
The mission was supposed to last thirty days. In case anything would go wrong, they provided us with an additional set of rations that would feed three people for fifty-six days. 

The ice hit when we were six days in, so that still left food for fifty days. And I know I’m a big guy but even I don’t have to eat nine rations a day. That means in total, I’m good with food for three hundred days. And that’s without rationing it.   
  
Now my situation on EVA suits - those meant for outside exploration - was a little more tricky. We had two sets of suits.    
Our EVA, Extravehicular Activity, and our IVA, Intravehicular Activity. We each had two of those. Of course, Matts and Sams EVAs are gone since they had worn them when the storm had hit us. My EVA is … not unfixabale but it’s gonna need some work. 

These suits are unisize so that was not really a problem. I’m wearing my IVA right now. 

The base held up admirably during the storm. Well, aside of the the broken antennas. But the heaters are still intact, which means the ice in the tanks is still being melted down and is still being filtered so I still have enough to drink. I would just have to go out once in a while, pick some ice and stuff it back in the tanks. Unfortunately, with the broken antenna I’ve lost contact to the weather station that was about five kilometres away and was supposed to warn us from shitty weather.

I checked on our plasma cells that generate our electricity. Each cell was 50 centimetres tall and 20 centimetres wide and contained the radioactive waste that had been withering away in the depths of earth, recycled into these compact time-bombs. 

We have two and two back-ups.

If these things break, I would have a Fall-Out situation right on Kerberos and possibly create some aliens myself but would never live to see them because I would die from radiation poisoning. It’s a day I’m not looking forward to.

We have two Rover but I haven’t checked those out yet since I’m still kind of recovering from the icicle in my hip.

Next on my list was the oxygenator and thank god, it’s in peak working condition! It’s linked to the plasma cells and sustained no damage at all. 

Here is how an oygenator works:

When you breathe, you expel CO2. The machine pulls the CO2 apart and recaptures the oxygen to dispel it back into the base. It was a steady process and thought out to perfection.

Once in a while, I have to compliment Galaxy Garrisons engineering. 

That means food, water and shelter are taken care of. The medical area was stocked to the brim with vitamins, bandages, band-aids and morphine.   
Enough morphine for a lethal dose, should things really go south.   
  


The real problem is - and that is my very own personal problem - that I am sick. 

I’ve been sick since I was a little boy and most of the doctors I’ve been to have told my grandfather that it would be a miracle if I lived past fifteen. When I was three, my pediatrician discovered what he first believed to be multiple sclerosis. While we still don’t have a cure, the disease had become treatable and there were drugs developed to make life easier for patients. So for a couple of years, I had been treated for MS. But soon the doctors found the symptoms didn’t quite match and they’ve been wandering in the dark about the disease ever since. 

I have been through bloodtests, medical studies, extensive health improvement treatments and whatnot and no one is any wiser. So when I was twelve I told them I had enough of the hospital stays, enough of the needles, enough of the nurses. I told them to just make it as painless as possible.

 

So I’ve been subscribed Diazepam and Motrin IB and was sent my way.    
The weird disease was mostly concentrated in my right arm, which is cramping almost all the time. The meds counteract the cramps fairly well and block out the pain and for quick relieve, I also wear a - specifically designed by Matt -  pressure bracelet. If I push a button on it, small electric impulses are sent through my arms that ease the cramps. It’s genius and I’m very grateful for Matt to think it up.

 

The long of the short of it is: I don’t have an infinte amount of medication with me. In fact, I have enough for fifty-six days. And I can’t ration my meds. So I might actually die of my disease up here, which might just means at some point I simply won’t be able to move anymore. Or my heartmuscle cramps up and I die of a heart attack.

 

I refuse to believe things will get this bad.

While I lay in my bunk yesterday night, I was thinking of a way to get out of here and I might have found a solution. 

Before we made our way to Kerberos, a supply ship had been sent ahead. On board of that ship had been a rover that was programmed to drive the supplies to the coordinates of the base. That rover was still parked behind the base.

But the supply ship is still out there, somewhere. I know absolutely everything there is to know about how to fly a ship and how to repair a ship.

 

I’m gonna find it and I’m gonna fix it, either to contact Earth or fly right back home.


	3. Sol 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In space, everything is possible, even crazy weather.

Log Entry: Sol 10

I can’t stop thinking about what Sam once told me: In the years they had surveyed the planets and moons of our solar system, he had never seen a moon with such little weather activity than Kerberos.

In ten years of video footage by drones, there have only been three recorded storms. No rain, no sunny days - of course - but for some reason, plenty of fog. Sams theory on the fog had been, that the core of Kerberos was periodically producing a burst of intense heat that traveled all the way up to the surface and made the ice evaporate.

Today, I went outside for the first time in four days. Have you ever seen the movie The Fog by John Carpenter? Yeah, it was like that but ten times worse.

If you haven’t seen the movie, just imagine you step outside and are immediately submerged in cold and wet cotton candy. I could barely see past myself. When I stretched out my hand it was gone. It was the craziest thing I have ever seen.

 

Sam, if you ever read this, I think I can confirm your theory. In the fog, the temperature had risen to 30 degree Celsius. And I am not kidding you. I know that’s a temperature difference of 70 degrees.  Almost felt like I was on the Bahamas. The crazy fog Bahamas.

 

Now - I’m not easily scared. I watch horror movies, I used to play horror games. I’ve been to Haunted Mansions. Hell, I’m stranded in space. That is pretty scary, if you ask me.

But I just stood at the edge of the airlock and I stared at that thick fog and I didn’t know if I could walk outside. I felt the heat around me, this impossible temperature that just didn't match with all the fog I saw and all the ice I still felt underneath me. My EVA could not process everything going on, so my screen was flickering occasionally. And it was so, so quiet.  
Even if I was alone I could still hear the ice crack sometimes outside or hear little bricks roll down hills. The fog absorbed every sound. My feet should have splashed over the slippery ice but there was just nothing. No sound at all. As if I had been dropped into the deepest and darkest pit of the ocean. The only sound I did hear was my beating heart.

If I think about it now, maybe I was so scared because I really realized that I was all by myself.

My way over to the water tanks was pretty tricky since it had not only become foggy but slippery too. That, however, made picking ice for the tanks pretty easy. The tanks were still half full with water, so my guess is that I have to get out about every twenty days to fill them up. It’s a good mean to measure how much time has passed. That and these logs I suppose.

 

I digress. I was talking about the weather, right. Three storms in ten years. Just how lucky could we have been to catch one of the rarest things on this moon? Lucky us.

 

Oh. I just realized I forgot the pickaxe at the tanks. The fog is still up but had gotten better. No matter. I should get the pickaxe or it might float away.

 

Log Entry: Sol 10-A 

I think I saw something move in the fog.


	4. Sol 11 - 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another chapter because I got inspired!

Log Entry: Sol 11

 

I couldn’t sleep last night. My arm had cramped a lot once I was in the bunk and I just know it’s because of the stress. It’s beginning to catch up to me. I took some painkillers and kind of drifted off but I kept waking up.

That’s crazy. 

It’s crazy, it’s too early for me to go nuts. I haven’t even been here for a month. I’m raking my brain trying to come up with a solution for what I saw yesterday.

Something had moved in the fog.  **I saw it.** It had a human shape, definetly two legs and it looked like it was carrying something. Something long - a sword or some kind of weapon-

 

Shiro.  _ That’s crazy.  _

 

Of course Aliens are real. It’s stupid to think that we are the only intelligent species in the entire universe. I even refuse to believe that we are the only species in the solar system. The guys are just really good at hiding.

But what  _ are the odds?! _

How lucky can a guy get?! I’m stuck on this moon at the end of the universe and instead of a restaurant, I find another species of beings. 

Maybe it wasn’t an alien after all. Maybe I was just tired and my imagination ran wild. 

 

But what if it wasn’t? I have no weapon aside from the pickaxe and the fight training we got at the Garrison. Who knew. They could easily overpower me. Kill me with just a look. 

Maybe the ice storm had not been an ice storm after all. Maybe it had really been the wind from a landing space ship that had to be … six times as big as Odysseus Y1, minimum.

 

**Shiro.**

**That’s crazy.**

 

I need to calm down. It must have been a trick of my mind. It was late, I was tired. Hell, I’m still tired. My arm hurts again and so does my head. I’m gonna rest up and then, tomorrow, I’ll see if the fog is gone and the Rover is up to speed for a little test drive. And there will be nothing out there. I will still be lonely. And the shadow in the fog was nothing than my imagination.

 

Log Entry: Sol 13

 

So I lost a whole day to a massive cramp in my leg. 

I managed to sleep more than the night before but I woke up to a nasty pain in my ankle. Since the morning, it had wandered up to my knee and into my hip and up my spine until my head started aching and I decided to just stay in bed. I kept blankets over the heaters and changed them once in a while.

Warmth really helps a lot with these muscle pains. At home, I would just take a really hot bath and just stay inside the tub until the water was cold and the pain was better or gone. 

But I’m stuck on a planet full of ice in a base that had one shower for three people. 

 

The pain is still there but not as bad as yesterday morning. 

It’s been a while since I last had such a bad push of my disease. It has to be because of the stress. I refuse to believe anything else. 

 

When I took stock of supplies a couple of days ago, I noticed stocks of heavy duty tarpaulin and I also believe I found an infinite amount of duct tape. I might just be able to craft myself a hot-water bottle for next time. That way, I won’t have to get up every hour or so to change the blankets. I really regret not bringing my heating blanket. I was honestly contemplating it but ultimately, I left it at home.  All my meds had made me feel like an old man already, I didn’t need Matt coming at me for bringing my heating blanket.    
On second thought, I’m gonna try out the bottle thing right now. I’ve been on bedrest for a day now and it’s still not quite gone. The good thing about the pain is that it saved me a ration since I’m never that hungry.

 

Log Entry: Sol 14

 

The hot-watter bottle worked amazing. Nothing leaked out and it kept me cozy all through the night. I’m feeling a lot better now. Today, I will go and check the Rover.


	5. Sol 14-16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so sorry for the slow update guys!!! Kingdom Hearts III was released and what can I say I was stuck in kh hell.  
> if you want, you can follow my twitter at UnwoundFuture for art, screaming about kingdom hearts, voltron, dc or friends, occasional dnd shenanigans and complaining about things in German. enjoy the new chapter!

Log Entry: Sol 14-A

 

Typing is really hard when your fingers are still thawing. I’m slowly starting to feel my nose again, too. In other news: The Rover works great. When I got outside, its windows were frozen over so I had to do some ice-scraping but when I started it up, it came alive like I had parked it just yesterday. 

 

Like everything else on Kerberos, the Rover runs on electricity from the Plasma Cells, so it’s currently plugged in its outlet outside. Its batteries were loaded still half a charge. We were never really supposed to take the Rovers for a joyride across the icy surface, so at full charge the Rover is good for a 100 kilometre drive. So even with half a charge, it was still enough to make the 5 km drive to the weather station. 

The weather station was busted as I suspected. The storm must have reached it earlier than us which means it came from the east.

 

To the east of the base is a huge open field. There is nothing but ice for miles on end. Our base is build among some tall rocks since we hoped it would shield us from any storms that could come. That worked out great.

 

So I decided to take the Rover a bit further and check out the field for signs. I mean I wasn't really expecting any corn circles but … well. The ice WAS scratched in weird shapes in a big radius- but this could be anything, right?

 

It could be leftover Rover tracks from when we got here and set up the weather station.

It could be frozen tracks from the drones that had come here before to survey the surface.

Heck, it could be tracks of extraterrestial animals that we have never seen before.

 

Or-

 

It’s the markings of an alien ship that destroyed the weather station. 

 

OR everything is all in my head and I was just seeing shapes in the ice because I wanted to see anything else but white everywhere. 

I’m gonna get some food and try to relax.

 

Log Entry Sol 16

 

Matthew Holt is a weeabo. 

 

It’s harsh, but it’s the truth and I’m glad that it’s finally out there. Matt, if you read this - I hate you. You had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to bring music to space, to let potential extraterrestial beings hear the art we humans can produce with sound and what did I find on your laptop? Anime openings. 

 

You have five different versions of the Dragon Ball Z opening, several, absolutely obnoxious, badly kazoo’ed songs and you brought your own covers to space, too?! 

 

You should have asked me, I would have taught you how to properly pronounce a n y japanese word you tried to say in your covers. It’s an honest slaughter of my native language.

 

Aside from about every anime opening from the past century, I found an embarassing amount of Britney Spears and Ariana Grande and now that I think about her again, I do remember hearing you squawking along to thank u, next under the shower one evening back at the Garrison. I should have known by then that we should have never left you in charge of music.

 

But - it helps. The music is filling the silence and the void that has been forming in the back of my mind. I miss you and Sam and Katie and Colleen and her home-cooked meals. 

 

I miss Adam, too.

 

I suppose I should say a few things to him- to you, Adam, if you ever read this. Yes, I still think you were wrong. The day you told me that you wouldn’t wait for me? I’ll be honest- it broke my heart. But not my determination to come here. This is my dream, this is everything I ever wanted to do, ever since I first learned about space back in third grade. I wish I could have shared it with you. But we decided to go our seperate ways and I have to deal with this now.

So whatever you are doing now, I hope you’re happy. I hope you’re doing well and that you found someone to share your life with. You are an amazing person, you were my rock for so many years and I really hope you find someone that can cherish you the way you deserve it. I’m not thinking ill of you and I hope you don’t, either. 

 

Maybe Ariana Grande is softening me up. 

 

I spent the last two days browsing through our notes and and trying to determine where the supply ship could be. I have a max distance of 100 kilometres to calculate with. That’s how far the Rover can go. When I checked the supply Rovers board computer, it told me it had driven a total distance of 78 kilometers to get from the ship to the base. Unfortunately, its wired to reach the coordinates of the base and I can’t backtrack the way it had come. 

Or if there is a way to do it, I don’t know how to do it. 

I know a lot about building and reparing a space ship but that seems like programming and hacking beyond my skill level. And I’m honestly scared to break the Rovers navigation system if I were to fumble around with it. 

 

So I actually have a 78 kilometre radius to work with. The Rover goes 60 km/h an hour, which is not very fast, but fast enough for what I want to do. If I were to take the 78 kilometre drive in every downwind, I could check the perimeter in a couple of days. 

The biggest problem with that is, that the Rover had taken this as a one-way-trip only. I would have to build a portable loading station so that I could charge the Rover up and drive back.

Which brings me to my next problem - charging the Rover at its docking station takes about four to five hours. THAT means I would have to wait inside the Rover for four to five hours. In the cold. Because running the heater while it was charging meant it would charge slower. Probably six or even seven hours.

 

You see my problem here, right? 

 

I heard a noise outside. 

  
  
  


Another storm. There is nothing quite like the sound of squalls smashing against the roof of the base and rattling the aluminum walls, right? 

Maybe writing will distract me from the heat building in my chest is this what a panic attacks feels like? breathing just got a lot more difficult but thats silly the oxygenerator is fine and it wasnt destroyed when the storm hit on Sol 6 it feels like i swallowed a batch of cotton and its blocking my throat my ears my brain the storm is too loud its so loud

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hope that I managed to convey shiros feelings in the way he wrote and that he didn't finish. i don't actually know how realistic that is so let me know!


	6. Sol 17 - 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoy a little physics lesson?

Log Entry Sol 17

 

Okay that was less than pleasant. 

It seems getting impaled by an icicle and being blown away through the snow and having to walk through blowing wind left a bad impression on me. Understandable. Let’s just hope there is not another one of these super rare ice storms coming.

I needed a while to calm down but this morning, I came up with an idea to look for the ship. We have a few tech supplies scattered about the base. Among them, Matts drone project. He had started building it from scrap on the way here because he had been bored from just flying through space. He had been almost done on Sol 6 but you know what happened.

  
I’m thinking I can finish it, wire it up and send it on a little joyride around Kerberos. I just have to figure out

  * how to make it resist the cold, 
  * make the batteries last through the -40 degree weather, 
  * create a wireless signal that lasts a long distance so it can livestream to this laptop AND
  * find out a way to measure the distance while it is flying,



Cool! That’s not so bad, is it?

 

Look, if I’m being honest, I’m not a techie. I’m an engineer, a pilot.

 

BUT this is not the time for self-doubt. If I can fix a big ship, I can build a drone. It shouldn’t be that hard, right? Maybe I just have to channel my inner Mattie by listening to his stupid covers. 

I said it before but I really miss them. There is no point in me complaining about that now. It feels good to have a plan. I can work on something now. I’m pretty sure I can do it. I just HAVE TO or else I’ll freeze to death on this moon and never have Colleens home made potato beef stew and her key lime pie and who would want to die without not having eaten another serving of that? I’m just so tired of air compressed food. Oh shoot, now I’m just thinking about that stew. 

Damn.

 

Log Entry Sol 22

I did it! 

 

It’s not very pretty and it’s certainly not the sleek cool look Matt has had in mind for it, but I did it! I built a drone from scratch! Well, not really, it was already almost done but you get it, right? 

Now the only “problem” is the wireless signal. But if I could build this drone, this should be my least problem. 

Wireless signals are electromagnetic waves travelling through the air. These are formed when electric energy travels through a piece of metal - for example a wire or antenna - and waves are formed around that piece of metal. These waves can travel some distance depending on the strength of that energy. There are a couple of different types of wireless signals. Radio, Bluetooth, GPS, you name it. 

They occupy a wide range of frequencies: the rate at which a signal vibrates. If it’s slow, it’s a low frequency. If the signal vibrates quickly, it has a high frequency. Frequency is measure in Hertz, which is the count of how quickly a signal changes every second. Communication needs high frequency, so we shortened the measurements to make it easier to say. Millions of vibrations a second is Megahertz. One thousand Megahertz make one Gigahertz.

In addition to having different frequencies, wireless signals can be different in the way they convey information. A wireless signal needs to be modulated - or changed - to send information. There are many types of modulation, and different technologies can use one or more types to send and receive information.

There are Transmitters and Receivers, self-explanatory, I think, and so called Transceivers, which can do both. I need the drone to be a Transceiver, since it needs to get my commands which direction to fly and avoid potential obstacles but it also needs to send me a live-feed of what it is seeing through its little camera eye. 

 

Since I have to cover a distance of 78 km in each direction, the drone needs to have a pretty big transmit power so it can send the signal over a long distance. And I probably have to find a way to amp up the receive sensitivity of the laptop. We measure the transmit power in milliwatt or dBm. For simplicity sake, I’ll use milliwatt (mW).

Long distance focus routers  need about 500mW to cover a distance of  10 to 20 kilometers. If I remember my math correctly, that would mean I need 1.950mW to cover the 78 km distance. Make it 2000mW. That’s 2 Watts of power. My drone must generate 2W of power. 

Normally, that isn’t a lot but my drone is like the size of an RC car with four propellers attached to four plastic wings. That makes it a quadrotor, I think.

Since I need the signal to go in one direction at a time, a focused antenna will work best for what I’m planning.

A satellite dish is a focused antenna, if you need a picture. The bowl allows the signal to be reflected and bounce back in the direction it came, increasing the power of the signal.

Matt brought batteries for the thing but of course those are not build to generate 2W of power in addition to making it fly and stabilize it in the air. 

 

Luckily, I don’t have to build a battery from scratch. Our EVAs are equipped with miniature plasma cells. 

 

Unfortunately, however, that means I have to pick apart one of my few and precious EVA suits.

 

I’d like to think that I won’t have a massive problem with that, I have EVA suits to spare, picking one apart, no problem? But I do have a massive problem with that. If all my EVA suits break, I’m stuck inside her until I die. Which won’t be very long. 

But I’ll do it. I have no other choice if I want to survive. Sacrifices must be made.

Now, I need to find a way to build a satellite dish. The dishes we used to stay in contact with Veronica and Curtis had been on top of the base but the Sol 6 storm completely trashed them.

I need to create a parabolic reflector and the receiver in the center of the satellite. I can build the reflector from some flagpoles we would usually use to mark where we already did some digging, and a space blanket from a first-aid kit. I can’t build the receiver from scratch but the weather station has a satellite. It’s busted but maybe I can fix up the receiver. There is no time here anyway, so I’ll go out and check the station once more.

 

Log Entry Sol 22-A

 

As I remembered correctly, the station was a total disaster. I took every part with me anyway. Stupid, I should have done that when I was there the first time. The receiver of the satellite does still look okay so I’m gonna start on the satellite dish, do some tests and then I’m gonna have to climb on the roof of the base and attach it there. 

Climbing on top of an icy roof is fun for the whole family! I made my way up using some rocks and the roof of the Rover as leverage. It was pretty damn cold up there but I managed. 

Without an injury if I may add. 

So, I got it all set up and now my legs hurt like hell, I’m tired, it feels like it’s the middle of the night but the drone works. I have a signal in here and can see myself on the screen right now in a small window.

I look like shit. This is the first time in 16 days that I really look at myself. We have a mirror in the bathroom but when I brush my teeth in the morning, I’m still half asleep. Despite popular belief, Takashi Shirogane is not a morning person. Oh no, I just remembered that I will run out of toothpaste eventually. Ew.

I never thought I could grow a stubble, but I did. Doesn’t look half bad, if I have to be honest. I suppose I will have a full beard by the time I fly back to Earth.

Naturally, I lost weight too. There is only so much calories you can get from astronauts food. But seeing myself in the camera of the drone is a thrilling feeling. I built this thing with my own two hands and it works.

 

I’m gonna switch it off and head to bed. For the first time since I’m here, I’m accompanied by a feeling of hope. 

I’m gonna find the ship. 

I’m gonna get off this moon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> now that the drone works, future chapters MIGHT just MIGHT (if I can figure it out) come with illustrations!


	7. Sol 23 - 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> all illustrations by me :D

Log Entry Sol 23

> I thought I’d share with you guys the selfie I made before I sent the drone on her way of a test flight to the busted weather station. 

Does this even count as a selfie? I did take it myself but I didn’t hold the camera? I’ve never been the selfie kind of guy, so pictures of me are few and far in between. 

I don’t wanna start with that now, so this will probably be the only picture of me you’ll find in these files. Yesterday, I thought I grew a stubble but looking at it now, this is almost a real beard. Wow. The real shame is my undercut growing out and having no chance of shaving it back down.

But then again, a little more hair is good for protection, huh?

The drones flight to the weather station went without any problems. The connection was a bit whacky now and then but she made it out safely. I finally got to take a look at the weird markings I mentioned earlier from a higher up position. Take a look:

 

There is the busted weather station and the marks in the ice. I mean-

Maybe I’m not crazy after all and there really are aliens on this planet. Or were, at least. The drone came back about an hour or two ago and I’ve been trying to find out just how these marks could have come to pass. What could they be?

Is this an indicator of the shape of their ship? It looks a lot bigger than the Odysseus, so no wonder the weather station was a bust. It must have landed right on top of it. 

Are the aliens hostile? Friendly? Humanoid, even?

Are they still here?

Or this is all just a trick of my mind and I’m really slowly going crazy? Tomorrow, I will start looking for the ship and get the hell out of here. 

The opportunity to meet extra terrestrials might only come once in my life but I have no way to defend myself and I would rather live.

Log Entry Sol 24

Turns out I couldn’t send the drone out because the fog is back. But I had to go out and refill the water tanks. I completely forgot about it because I was so busy building Matt Jr. 

But at least the temperature makes it easier to pick ice loose and stuff it back in the tank. 

So while I’m waiting for the fog to dispel, I’m gonna try to solve a new issue: how damaged will the supply ship be and will I be able to transport the stuff to fix it?

Technically, it should only have surface damage, nothing more than a few scratches and dents. But it’s been caught in two storms and I saw what the first storm did to the base and to me. So chances are this thing is even more broken than I expected. 

If I absolutely need to fix the outer shell, I will have to take parts of the base.

The base was designed for three people. It has a living area with bunk-beds and a bathroom as well as a small kitchenette. There is also a storage area full of food, supplies and the EVA-Suits. Last but not least is the research-area, which is as big as storage and living area combined.  It also holds the Oxygenator and the Power Cells. 

It is absolutely possible for me to move all the stuff from the storage into the research-area and remove the entire room. Of course that would mean hours of hours of hard labor in -40 degree weather but I don’t have any other way of getting material for the outer shell.

The much bigger problem would be broken machinery. I have two Rovers so if push should come to shove, I can sacrifice one of them for spareparts. It gets tricky as soon as I have to use up the other one. Because that means I will be stuck at the ship.

Let’s just hope it’s not gonna get that far. 

The ship is technically a drone so it’s entirely possible that there will be no room for me to sit and fly it. In theory, I don’t have to fly it. If I can rewrite its programming to fly back the exact way it had come, it should just take off and fly me straight back home.

The supply ship was a little slower than the Odysseus Y1 and needed 90 days for the trip. That means I need to have ratios for at least 89 days. I can do without food for one day.

It’s Sol 24 today. 

That means I have 187 days to find the ship, assess its situation, fix it and leave this moon.

  
  


Log Entry Sol 26

The drone doesn’t fly very fast so I needed about the entirety of yesterday to cover the first two directions, which were North and North-East from the base. Towards the end of the North-East run, I saw the same weird markings in the ground again, farer away than the weather station but not much. 

It was proof enough for me that I’m not crazy. And that there really were Aliens around here. My mind has been going absolutely crazy since then. 

How many Aliens are we talking about here? 

Are they always the same ones? 

The markings looked the same but that doesn’t have to mean anything. 

Are they humanoid? Do they have a set number of legs? Are they shapeshifters?

Could I communicate with them?

_ Should I? _

The thought just now occurred to me. What if they have just three or four landing spaces on this moon that’s why the markings were never carried away by weather. Could I leave a message for them in the ice? I’m not sure if this is the smartest thing to do - I still have no means of defending myself. 

But there was also the chance that they could help me. 

It’s foolish to just assume that every other species is hostile. Assumptions like these are what made hundreds of ‘The-AI-Turned-Evil’ movies and now everyone believes that AIs will at someday just go crazy and kill everyone. 

I don’t want to go as far as saying they could give me a lift but who was to say that they weren’t on their way to Earth already? They are so close already. 

  
I can hear another storm coming. I’m just gonna go and blast Matts stupid songs to distract myself from it.

Log Entry Sol 28

My base was ransacked.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> somebody explain to me how to put pictures in the center in HTML because it doesn't work with the tools


	8. INTERMISSION

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, I'm so sorry for the terribly slow updates, I came up with a tendonitis in my right elbow and my left arm :/ I hope things will be better soon, but I managed to type up a new chapter anyway. I hope you enjoy!

**INTERMISSION**

Matt still remembered the day Shiro told him he was allowed to pilot. 

He had hung around his lab and was tinkering around with his delivery drone. His baby was nearly done when Shiro suddenly burst into the room displaying an excitement that Matt barely knew of him. Shiro was his best friend and the only guy in the Garrison who would put up with his weird tech blabbering.    
Shiro was not someone who wore his heart on his sleeve and so seeing him this happy was always a blast. “Mattie” he had yelled and Matt threw his screwdriver away and almost jumped over the table. He knew immediately what this was about. “Iverson finally said Yes?!” he wanted to know and Shiro nearly crushed into him. He wrapped his arms around him and lifted him up in a bone crunching hug. “Yeah!!” he just said, the grin spread from one of his big ear to the other. He looked like a huge dork and Matt loved this face on him. “Congrats!! I wouldn't have gone had they picked another pilot.” he called out and hugged Shiro back although it was weak, since he had noodles for arms and Shiro was basically The Rock. Shiro just laughed and put him down “No, you would have gone.” he disagreed and Matt picked up the screwdriver, waving it back and forth “True. But I would not have been happy about it.” 

Shiro grabbed a bottle of lemonade from Matt's minibar and slumped down into the chair next to Matt's work bank. “Man”, he huffed and unbuttoned his uniform “I can't believe it.” He laughed again and rubbed his eyebrows.

“I can't believe it.” Matt grabbed himself a bottle too and leaned against the table next to him. They toasted each other.    
“You deserve it Shiro. You really do.”

 

“He’s dead”, Matt repeated over and over again. 

He was pacing back and forth at the windows of the Odysseus Y1, blind to the beautiful star scapes rolling past them. He was blind to most anything, ever since they left. All he could think of was Shiros face when he had been pierced by that icycle and was thrown into the storm. 

 

Matts stomach churned in on itself. Never to be seen again. Never to get a funeral. 

 

By the time they would get back to pick him up, his corpse would be somewhere else. Or frozen solid underneath the surface of the planet.

His father was the pilot back. They were on route for 22 days now and Matt was unable to think about anything else.

“Dad, we left Shiro behind. This isn’t right, we should go back, we should look for his corpse.” he said and fell back into the seat next to his Dad. He could not believe that the mission would end just like that, that they had to evacuate during a storm and that Shiro was dead. He should be the one to take them back, not his father, who was a mediocre pilot at best. Sam jaw was tight and his hands clenched around the controls of the ship. “Matt, please”; he said “we talked about that. We can’t go back, the fuel would not last.” he said, looking straight ahead.

In a fit, Matt kicked the dashboard. “It’s not fair!” he said and stood up again. This all wasn’t fair. Shiro deserved to be back on Earth.

“He saved us! It’s the least we should do!!”

“Matt!” Sam barely rose his voice against his son and he agreed with him wholeheartedly, but they just had no way to get back without being stuck on Kerberos as well.

_ “What happened was terrible but Shiro wouldn’t want you to risk his life after he lost his to get you to safety. _ ” Veronicas voice came through the voicechannel which only made Matt more mad. “This is bullshit”, he cursed under his breath and walked over to his working station at the back of the ship. He and his father would take turns flying, even though most of the route without Shiro happened on autopilot.

They didn’t talk about much else for nearly two months. 

Matt hated it. 

He hated every minute on this cursed ship and he began hating this mission that had taken his best friend from him.

 

When they got back to Earth, Veronica and Curtis were right there. They landed some time in the middle of the night and were immediately pulled into the medical bay where they were checked through. Matt let it all happen. The last two months he had barely talked to his Dad and his Dad had barely opened conversation. 

It was just quiet. 

They held a ceremonial burial for Takashi Shirogane just a week after the Odysseus Y1 had safely landed. They put up a big picture of Shiro in his best uniform in a golden frame. Countless of flowers were distributed all over the stone steps in front of the soldiers memorial. Shiros golden plaque was going to be the first one on it, right in the center. Iverson stood in front of the crowd and held a speech about Shiros heroism and brave sacrifice. Matt felt sick to his stomach as he watched his father walking up to the speakers podium. He could see Adam from the corner of his eyes, jaw clenched, fists tight on his thighs. His glasses were reflecting the glaring neon-lights that illuminated the room, but Matt thought that maybe those were tears glistening in his eyes. He wasn’t the only one crying. A lot of people were here that had liked Shiro, that were crying genuine tears for him. 

Matt - somehow - couldn’t. 

This was all wrong. They should get back there and get his corpse, he deserved to be buried back home on Earth and not just freeze away on Kerberos to never be found again. After the death of a pilot, Matt was sure they would never send a team out there again. Or at least not in the near future. It just wasn’t fair.

 

“Takashi - well most of you called him Shiro - Shiros life had been limited from the start”, Sams voice made Matt look up with a frown. “Some of you may know that he was terminally ill. Going on this mission- going into space had been his dream since he was a child. So I’m glad that despite the hardships he had to face, he managed to fulfill his dream. I wish he would be standing here next to us but ... “ his voice trailed off for a moment. “I will forever be grateful for his sacrifice.” he said. He stepped forward and grabbed the plague from the silken pillow that Iverson was holding. With a grim face, he carried the plaque to the wall and fixed it to it.

 

_ In memoriam Takashi Shirogane. _


	9. Sol 31

Log Entry Sol 31

The good news is: my base wasn’t ransacked. Well- it was but nothing is missing. In fact, even my drone is still here. And my food. The oxygenator still works. The rovers are still good. So are the suits. My laptop is fine. Everything looks okay. There is even an Alien in the living quarters.

Writing it down doesn’t make it any less weird.

There is an Alien in the living quarters. He (??)... they are humanoid, a little smaller than me with long hair. It’s braided and falls over their shoulder. Their skin is ...lilac. The uniform they wear is black with glowing, purple stripes on their chest. They certainly have the built of a male - flat chest, narrow hips, broad shoulders - but they are an alien and they could quite possibly be the most beautiful female version of their race. If they even have genders. Maybe they are like snails? God, what am I even writing.

I was taking the Rover on a ride to some other markings I found with the drone a way out west. I was gone for at least two or three hours and when I came back my base was- well a disaster. At first I thought I was hallucinating. The airlock had been normal so someone must have come in and threw everything around but take nothing with him. I saw the blood only minutes later. I assumed it was blood. It was certainly as red as mine and it was smeared across the floor as if someone had dragged himself all the way to my living quarters. And what do you know, someone had. That Alien. They must have looked for first aid because all the supplies were scattered on the floor and they had passed out. 

Hostile Alien or not, I couldn’t just let them lay in my base and bleed to death and so I picked them up and put them on one of the stretchers. They are surprisingly light-weight…

So I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out how to open their suit so I cut it open and peeled them out of it, feeling like a weird scientist while I did so. They have stripes on their shoulders down to the center of their chest. They don’t stand out or something, they almost look like tattoos. They are in a slightly darker shade of lilac. 

Their injuries are bad but I can’t tell what happened. They have bruises and scratches all over the left side of their face and there is this really big gash on their side that was bleeding like crazy. I still don’t know if they are going to be alright. I patched them up as good as I good and they stopped bleeding but. What do I know. 

 

This all happened two days ago. I cleaned everything up. They still haven’t woken up.

 

I’m trying to think of a way on how to handle this situation. There is an Alien in one of the beds. I have not slept in two days. For all I know, the guy could wake up and unhinge his jaw and eat me. Or have laser eyes. Damn, I’m tired.

* * *

 

 

Shiro turns the laptop off then, and gets up from the working area. It’s well after 10 pm, according to the clock on his screen. Of course, time out here means nothing. 

It’s always dark, it’s always cold. 

Sometimes, he wakes up in the morning and shines a lamp in his face and pretends it’s the sun. It’s not nearly as warm. The Alien is still in the living quarters, on Matts former cod and as far as Shiro can tell, they are asleep.

Carefully, he pats into said quarters and looks at the slim frame resting under the cover. Inside the base, it’s warm enough for Shiro to wear sweatpants and a matching sweater and sort of house-shoes. Snug, grey thermal socks with a firm rubber sole. So he makes no sound when he walks over and looks at the Alien. Alien. 

There really is an Alien in my bedroom, Shiro thinks and barely holds back a snort. 

He rubs his palm over his eyes and puts it to his hurting arm. The Alien was … attractive by Earth standards. Of course, that was nothing he could write into his logs. The dim bedside light illuminated a finely curved nose. Their features were soft, feminine almost but their jaw could cut glass. Their lashes were thick and had a dark purple shade.

It was almost as if some sort of fairy royalty had broken into Shiros base. 

He sighs and turns away, aware that he was leaning over the alien in an almost creepy way. All sorts of feelings have been shooting through his brain ever since he had treated the alien, had put one of Matts sweaters over them - it’d fit well enough - and had put them in bed. It would’ve been weird to just leave them bare chested like that. 

Just because he is so damn tired, he grabs his hot-water bottle from his cod above and decides to fill it up. If the alien was still asleep, maybe it was okay to sleep too? He could pick out Sams cod. It was adjacent to the alien, but behind his head so maybe he would not kill him immediately and Shiro still had time to hide … somewhere?

With his bottle full, he climbs into the sheets and wraps his arm around the warm rubber. From his position, he can see the top of the Aliens head. He has a hair whorls right in the center. A few of the strands are messy around it. Shiro swallows dryly.

For the first time in almost a month, he can listen to another being breathing. It sounds normal, like any other human would breath.

For the first time in almost a month, Shiro does not fall asleep to the crippling feeling of loneliness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tell me what you think of the shift to present tense!


	10. "Don't panic"

 

> _“Nothing travels faster than the speed of light with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.”_  
>  ―  Douglas Adams
> 
>  

**"Don't panic"**

Shiro wakes up in the morning to the smell of coffee. He is too tired to think and so he just keeps his eyes closed for a bit. Yes, he was home. Of course. All of it had been a very intense dream and he wasn't actually stuck on Kerberos.

He was at home and Adam was in the kitchen and made breakfast. In a couple of days, he would leave for Kerberos. He was gonna have the time of his life in space. Right, it was time to get up and take a good long hot shower.

Shiro opens his eyes with a warm feeling and is smack in the face with the cold reality. The ceiling above him is a shade of silvery grey. He can see tiny screws where the plates of the base are hold together. Right - the base. He wasn’t home. He is stuck in space and there is an Alien sleeping in the room with him.

He sits up with a big sigh and rubs the balls of his hands over his eyes. He stops and sinks his hands.

There is an Alien sleeping in the room with him.

Shiro whips his head around so fast that his neck cracks and he hisses. The bed adjacent to him was empty. The smell of coffee was very much real, but- that meant the Alien must currently be the one making breakfast.

In all the twenty-five days he had been stuck on Kerberos, Shiro had tried to convince himself that he was not going crazy but now he is sure that he had lost his mind.

An Alien would not be in the kitchen making breakfast. An Alien probably doesn’t even have a concept of meals over the course of the day.

He pushes the blanket off his feet and puts his hot-water bottle aside. The bunkbeds the Alien had slept on were attached to a wall that stood in the middle of the living quarters and that served as sort of a room divider. On the other side of that wall is a table to eat food at. The kitchenette is embedded into the wall across the dining table.

And standing, with the back to him, is the Alien. Shiro moves slowly and isn’t sure if he should make his presence known or if he should try to grab a chair and be ready to whack the Alien with it. Just in case they decide to turn around and spit poison at him. Unfortunately, Shiro is not as stealthy as he wishes to be and instead knocks his knee on a container he had left standing around a couple of days ago. The pain tingles through his thigh and makes him curse. He puts one hand on top of the container and rubs his knee with his other hand. As the pain fades, Shiro lifts his head and suddenly, the Alien stands right in front of him, too close for comfort and Shiro lets out a not so manly yelp, stumbling back.

Their eyes are beautiful, sharp and had an intense purple color. Like the night just before the sun rises again.

He had never seen anything like them and he is pretty sure he is in no position to swoon over an extraterrestrial being who could possible kill him with just a laserbeam shooting from his fingers.

When he stumbled back, the Alien had reached out for him and slender lilac fingers hover at his eyelevel. They certainly don’t look like they could shoot laser from them. They were pretty but their nails looked sharp, like claws. Shiro pulls his head back some more and clears his throat. “Sorry”, he says even though they can’t understand him. He rubs his neck and pats his clothes down to even out any of the crinkles that could be left from sleeping. As if he has to make a good first impression, he stands straight and looks at the Alien who - to his surprise - is chuckling. They stand straight too and Shiro can’t believe they are laughing at him. For what? For hitting his knee? For straightening his clothes? What in the world is going on.

“Uh… I’m Shiro.” he says. He puts his palm flat on his chest when he says ‘I’m’, hoping that the Alien understands that he meant himself. “Sheeroo”, he pronounces his name in long syllables and pats his own chest.

The Alien laugh and turn away from him. They grab the two cups of coffee they have prepared and set them on the dining table. Shiro is stumped. Are they laughing at him? About him? They sit down on one of the chairs and motion to the chair opposite of him as if this was their base and Shiro was the intruder. He remains standing and just stares at them.

“I’m Keith.” They imitate his chest patting with a smile. “Keeeith.”

Shiros jaw falls to the floor and he cannot help but stare. The Alien is not only speaking his language, but they have such a next-door neighbor name, Shiro is shook. “Y-You speak my language?!” he shrieks and feels glued to the floor. His shock just seems to make them laugh more.

“More or less”, they say and they wave at the chair in front of them again. Finally, finally Shiro sits down and warily puts his hand to the plastic mug. “How?” he just croaks and decides to drown himself in the hot coffee. He is still not convinced that all of this is not a dream. The Alien in front of him still has lilac skin, intense eyes and has done their braid anew so it looks proper and rested around their neck like a scarf. They shrug “My mother teaches me”, they say and Shiro can’t help but think that their voice sound male.

“I want to say thank you for helping”, they say and put their hand to their side. “For helping me and for clothes. Also, I’m sorry for breaking in. I hope I broke nothing.” their english isn’t quite perfect and they have an accent that almost sounds Texan. Voice and look don’t add up and Shiro doesn’t know what to do with it. He realizes he is staring again and quickly clears his throat. “O-Of course”; he says and looks away “I couldn’t just let you to die, you are the first person I’ve seen in nearly a month.” he says.

Keith nods with a smile and when they try their coffee, they pull a face that Shiro can’t call anything else but absolutely adorable. “Bleurgh”, they make and push the cup back “My mother always talks big about this but it’s awful.” they say and the way they pronounce awful as something that sounds like ‘aahfil’ is the last straw. Shiro laughs and quickly hides in his own cup. The coffee they had sent along to space is truly an awful quality but it sufficed. Keith shoot him a look but smile, too. They put their hands on the table and for a bit, it’s quiet.

Neither of them seem to know what to say.

“So...why were you hurt?” Shiro asks eventually, when half his cup is empty.

Keith clears their throat “I was on a reckon mission.” they say “The Blades of Marmora have been watching this quadrant for several Deca-Phoebs now and when we saw you arrive, we decided to monitor more closely. To see what you would do. If you wanted to go further and cross into Andromeda.

We saw ship leave again after one movement and thought that everyone was gone. But then I noticed you.” they seem to hesitate for a moment and Shiro frowns.

  
So there had not only been Aliens on Kerberos after all, but they had watched him, too?

“I want to check on you because you are human and I have never seen a human before.” they tell him and Shiro just furrows his brows. Keith doesn’t look like he is done talking, so he takes a sip of his coffee once more. There were so many new words and it was a little overwhelming. He watches as Keith put their knuckles together in a surprisingly nervous motion.

“Before I can approach you, my ship was attacked by a Galra scout. I managed to bring them down but I got hurt and crawled here. And now this.” they motion to the table in front of them and to their coffees.

Shiro shakes his head. “Deca-Phoebs? Movement? Galra Scouts?” he asks and puts his hand to his forehead “What does that all mean, does that mean more Aliens are coming?” he wants to know and leans forward “I can’t … I have nothing here to fight.” he says and Keith quickly lift their hands.

“You don’t have to”, they say “I shot the scout down and I think there will not be any more coming.” they sounded confident about it and Shiro believes them. His head is spinning from all the information, but he believes them.

He doesn’t exactly know why.

“So… are you a Galra?” he eventually asks when his mug is empty. Keith nods “Half”, they say “My mother is Galra and my father was human. He died and my mother took me along.”

“To the Blades of Marmora? What is that?”

“A spy organization working against the Galra Empire.”

“Why work against your own people?” Briefly, Shiro thinks that Keith might be one of the bad guys here.

“The Galra Empire destroyed and conquered most of the universe. It’s been ruled by Zarkon for more than 10.000 years. We are hoping to find a way for a rebellion.”

Shiro stares at the table and tries to let that sink in. An alien emperor has been ruling the universe for more than ten thousand years?

“Are Galra immortal?” he wants to know in a quiet voice and Keith shake their head once more.

“No. Zarkon is still alive using Quintessence. A form of … energy that run through every being. He and his witch use it to stay alive.”

Shiro stands up then, convinced that he really has lost his mind. He walks over to the kitchenette, grabs a ration and slams it into the microwave with some water, not even sure if he is hungry or not. He feels downright dizzy. This was so much information at once and he does not know what to do with it. He leans with his arms on the counter and watches the water drip down into the sink. The microwave hums.

“Are they already in the Milky Way?” he whispers and Keith does not reply, not immediately.

“Keith. Are they close to my home?”

“Not yet”, they reply and Shiro exhales. He turns around and looks at them. “What am I gonna do?”

“You? Nothing. You should forget about it.”

“Then why did you tell me?”

Keith is quiet again, looking down on their mug. “I feel that you deserve truth after saving my life.” they say.

Shiro does not know what to reply and looks at Keith. The microwave beeps but Shiro ignores it.

Keith seems to regret everything they told him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since this is still a little Shiros POV, he is gonna think of Keith a little while longer as a they


End file.
